Turks advance in Syria

AZAZ, SYRIA» Fighting raged Saturday in northwestern Syria as Turkish troops and allied militiamen tried to advance their weeklong offensive in a Kurdishcontrolled enclave, Syrian opposition activists said.

The bombardment could be heard a few miles away from Afrin in the Turkishcontrolled town of Azaz, where Associated Press journalists were on a media trip organized by the Turkish government and escorted by Turkey-backed Syrian opposition fighters taking part in the offensive.

Azaz is one of the fronts from where Turkish troops and allied Syrian fighters of the so-called Free Syrian Army have launched a push into Afrin to clear the area of a Syrian Kurdish militia which Ankara considers to be a national security threat. The militia known as the People’s Protection Units, or YPG, has been a partner of the United States in the fight against the Islamic State group in Syria.

Kurdish and other activists said Saturday’s fighting concentrated around the Rajo area in Afrin, amid heavy shelling and airstrikes by the Turkish forces. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the Syria war through a network of activists on the ground, said Turkish helicopters were attacking the town of Rajo, struggling to make progress after a week of attacks. The Turkish military said in a statement that two Turkish soldiers and two allied Syrian fighters were killed Saturday.